Chronicles I: Operation Lightspeed
by PinkRangerV
Summary: The battle to save the galaxy has begun.
1. Prologue

A\N: My full author's note was too long to fit on the page and was wrecking the story, so I put the behind-the-scenes explanation of the story on my profile. Enjoy the fic!

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><p>The ship catches one's eye.<p>

It's all right to be impressed. In space, you could float for all of eternity and see nothing but the vast night sky. Even with a map and rockets, you would take years to reach so much as another planet in this solar system.

So if you've been floating in space, a giant ship screaming down on you out of nowhere would be surprising.

It doesn't scream, of course. There's no sound in space. But the jarring pull of gravity as it shudders into reality makes something primal in the brain create an noise, a roaring sound that would be comparable, maybe, to standing next to a thousand jet engines.

Maybe. After all, the human mind is capable of amazing things. Sounds are no exception.

The behemoth, unaware of that ungodly sound, comes to a slow halt. It cannot be seen clearly; the only reason that it could be seen at all is because, at this close range, the holographic cloaking doesn't matter. Any enemy warship, a Goliath to match this one, would have collided instantly, and a smaller ship...

Well, when your ship is a full mile long, enemy crafts don't particularly matter.

The ship continues on for a moment before its shields flicker off, and with it the cloaking devices that kept it safely hidden. And now, of course, if you were watching you would have to follow it, since being caught in its gravitational well is nothing to laugh at, even if it is smaller than a planet. Now the true size and majesty of the warship is revealed.

The allegiance should be obvious. After all, there are only two powers in the galaxy, and both have very distinctive warships. The Eltarian-based Council of Light, to enhance their transportation system's energy\matter displacement, paints their warships a bright blue, while the Dark Court's ships go unpainted, since there is no point spending the money when a wormhole really doesn't care what color you are.

But both ships have lights that are like little galaxies, and when this ship's lights flicker on, the allegiance is obvious.

Yes, a full city's worth of lights are there. But when that's barely a quarter of the outside lights, the ship is running on a skeleton crew. Painted, unpainted; it no longer matters.

This ship is bound for Earth.

And, indeed, after a day or two of slower-than-light traveling, Earth appears as a small blue planet, its moon, Luna, growing larger and larger. This is when confusion sets in. The ship, large as it is, should be headed directly for Earth. This is a refugee ship, after all. The protocol is standard; the ship will approach, place its occupants in smaller ships, then use the gravity well of Earth to slingshot away for its next group of passengers while the smaller ships land on whatever part of Earth the refugees feel like calling home.

But instead, it seems to be headed for the _moon_.

Perhaps this is a Dark Court ship after all? Rita and Zedd ch'Arria, minor monarchs within the complex political system of the Dark Court, once took refuge on Luna's surface, battling by proxy with Eltar's Power Rangers. And the unpainted ship is most certainly heading for the moon. Maybe there is something within the lunar palace's ruins that should be retrieved, or perhaps new foes are going to appear-

Four dots detach.

They are marked by bright flares of light, and shoot off in a perfect formation. Their jets glow a beautiful blue, leaving a slight trail in their wake. They are fighter ships, and their pilots perform a quick series of maneuvers to ensure coordination before taking off.

They head for Earth.

In space, you cannot know that Earth is anything but a heaven. Many before you have made that same mistake. Refugees, who saw Earth's unique, precarious inability to be claimed by anyone as a blessing, flooded the planet's surface in the hopes of creating a life without any wars. And from this distance, it seems majestically serene, and you understand why her people call her Mother Earth, for there is something inherently maternal in the life-giving greens that the planet displays.

But if you could, you would see turmoil.

The world rages in debate. Are aliens good? Or evil? Have they come to help or hinder us? The fight has long been spread across the world, with every person their own answer, ranging from violent hatred to welcome and eager cooperation.

But when the fighters scream into the atmosphere, burning bright as suns from the friction, the fight suddenly becomes a single nation's, a single city's.

A corrupt government organization. A nation traumatized by a terrorist. Democrats vs. Republicans. War vs. Peace. Good vs. Evil.

The locus of a thousand battles and political moves falls in four bright, burning suns as the Daemon arrive to reclaim their city.

_Operation: Lightspeed Rescue_ has begun.


	2. Chapter 1

A\N: 'Sidhe'ra' is pronounced 'shee-ra'. _Ban Sidhe_ are the Banshee, Celtic evil fairies, so I figured that if Lightspeed was going to mispronounce a name... I'm also working on Ryan's voice, so let me know how you like it. Enjoy the chapter!

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><p>When I saw them, screaming into the atmosphere and burning like meteors, I was terrified.<p>

Everyone was. Screams, gunshots, the whole works-there was a news report, later, about people getting trampled to death. It's not like San Jose is a small town, after all. And four fighter crafts, shooting into the atmosphere with as much noise as possible, then pulling off a flawless series of maneuvers while _still on fire_?

I should have known there would be deaths.

Come to that, I probably should feel guilty, too. I'm Dana Mitchell. Being a healer is who I _am_; 'paramedic' is just a name for it.

But my terror faded pretty quickly, so by the time they started their maneuvers, I stood in the middle of a deserted San Jose flea market, watching in awe.

I'm the Pink Lightspeed Ranger now. My team and I do configurations with our Zords all the time, for charity or just because Joel wants to show off. It's not like I've never seen that sort of maneuvering, or even done it myself.

But somehow, I've never seen anything more beautiful.

*PRLS*PRLS*PRLS*

My name is Ryan ch'Nitle, and this is what happened when I came to Earth.

I used to live on Earth, when I was a baby. My _Amal_,(my mother) codenamed Vypra, she took me to Daos. It's this warrior planet, where the _whole thing_ (except for a couple of villages near the equator) is this one giant school. It was...how do Earthers say it? Wicked awesome?

Then my teachers called me to headquarters.

I thought I was just going to move to another level or something. I mean, I was _nineteen._ I know I'm half-human, but that's still pretty young to be graduating, and I just couldn't think of any bad reasons why I'd get called there. _Amal_'s pretty tough, and she's the only real family I have.

_Jakin_ Hakim was there, though.

He's the prince of the Earth Daemon. Not really a _prince_ or something-I keep forgetting I'm writing this for humans-but their leader. We call all our leaders 'prince' or 'princess'. The Earth Daemon are more like monks, or they were to start out with. I was never too good with Earth history.

He was polite and we went through the rituals, blah blah blah. Then he told me why he was there.

I don't know how many people reading this know what was going on back then. Earth was really, really young. Most planets, they're either part of Eltar or the Dark Court, but Earth was just...like, you couldn't have someone in the UN if they were still figuring out television, right? That was Earth. It's why Hakim's group lived there. They were going to live in peace, like the Earth's Amish try to live away from technology.

But the humans didn't really like them. They called them the servants of this big evil spirit called Satan and tried to kill them. By that point, it had gotten so bad that the humans took over an old holy site, renamed it San Jose, and built a big ugly city over it.

The Daemon Queen, Sidhe'ra, wanted to make a point. No more death. No more hate.

So she wanted a team to stop it.

There would be four Daemon. One was _Jakin_ Hakim, who would be codenamed Diabolico. And one was me.

And he wanted me to help find the others.

Whoever's reading this is probably wondering why I said yes. I mean, you're human, right? So you don't quite understand why I fought against you.

Most Daemon didn't either.

Jinxer (another codename) just wanted to work on things in his laboratory until we explained. _Amal_ almost had a fit when she saw me there. And a lot of people...well, later, when I got back, I read some of the stuff about us, and it was pretty nasty.

There's this thing my teachers taught me called the _spirit of battle_. It's really different from how humans (or at least American humans) see things. You're not a rebel underdog fighting for some lost cause and angsting about it.

Instead it's just you, screaming through the atmosphere, knowing that you're on the right side. That you have the blessing of your Queen, your teammates by your side, an army to back you up, and that the end result might stop a war between species.

And then, for no reason at all, leading your team in maneuvers while you're still on fire, just to show off.

_That's_ the spirit of battle. Pride. Honor. Courage. Doing what's right.

I have a sister who lives on Earth. She's probably dead now, since she's half-blood like me. But while I flew in those formations, I wasn't thinking about what would happen next, and even though that's what they want me to write about I won't. I mean, we all know how Lightspeed was formed, and that we only found the underground caves instead of our palace, and that _Fir'lit,_ a Daemon warrior we sent to consecrate the battlefield by sparring with the Rangers, was killed when the Power Rangers misunderstood and thought he was an enemy.

There's nothing to write about because it's already been said.

But that formation...

No one's said that I hoped that, wherever my sister was, I wanted her to see my spirit of battle too.


	3. Chapter 2

A\N: 'Sidhe'ra' is pronounced 'shee-ra'. _Ban Sidhe_ are the Banshee, Celtic evil fairies, so I figured that if Lightspeed was going to mispronounce a name... I'm also working on Ryan's voice, so let me know how you like it. Enjoy the chapter!

* * *

><p>When I saw them, screaming into the atmosphere and burning like meteors, I was terrified.<p>

Everyone was. Screams, gunshots, the whole works-there was a news report, later, about people getting trampled to death. It's not like San Jose is a small town, after all. And four fighter crafts, shooting into the atmosphere with as much noise as possible, then pulling off a flawless series of maneuvers while _still on fire_?

I should have known there would be deaths.

Come to that, I probably should feel guilty, too. I'm Dana Mitchell. Being a healer is who I _am_; 'paramedic' is just a name for it.

But my terror faded pretty quickly, so by the time they started their maneuvers, I stood in the middle of a deserted San Jose flea market, watching in awe.

I'm the Pink Lightspeed Ranger now. My team and I do configurations with our Zords all the time, for charity or just because Joel wants to show off. It's not like I've never seen that sort of maneuvering, or even done it myself.

But somehow, I've never seen anything more beautiful.

*PRLS*PRLS*PRLS*

My name is Ryan ch'Nitle, and this is what happened when I came to Earth.

I used to live on Earth, when I was a baby. My _Amal_,(my mother) codenamed Vypra, she took me to Daos. It's this warrior planet, where the _whole thing_ (except for a couple of villages near the equator) is this one giant school. It was...how do Earthers say it? Wicked awesome?

Then my teachers called me to headquarters.

I thought I was just going to move to another level or something. I mean, I was _nineteen._ I know I'm half-human, but that's still pretty young to be graduating, and I just couldn't think of any bad reasons why I'd get called there. _Amal_'s pretty tough, and she's the only real family I have.

_Jakin_ Hakim was there, though.

He's the prince of the Earth Daemon. Not really a _prince_ or something-I keep forgetting I'm writing this for humans-but their leader. We call all our leaders 'prince' or 'princess'. The Earth Daemon are more like monks, or they were to start out with. I was never too good with Earth history.

He was polite and we went through the rituals, blah blah blah. Then he told me why he was there.

I don't know how many people reading this know what was going on back then. Earth was really, really young. Most planets, they're either part of Eltar or the Dark Court, but Earth was just...like, you couldn't have someone in the UN if they were still figuring out television, right? That was Earth. It's why Hakim's group lived there. They were going to live in peace, like the Earth's Amish try to live away from technology.

But the humans didn't really like them. They called them the servants of this big evil spirit called Satan and tried to kill them. By that point, it had gotten so bad that the humans took over an old holy site, renamed it San Jose, and built a big ugly city over it.

The Daemon Queen, Sidhe'ra, wanted to make a point. No more death. No more hate.

So she wanted a team to stop it.

There would be four Daemon. One was _Jakin_ Hakim, who would be codenamed Diabolico. And one was me.

And he wanted me to help find the others.

Whoever's reading this is probably wondering why I said yes. I mean, you're human, right? So you don't quite understand why I fought against you.

Most Daemon didn't either.

Jinxer (another codename) just wanted to work on things in his laboratory until we explained. _Amal_ almost had a fit when she saw me there. And a lot of people...well, later, when I got back, I read some of the stuff about us, and it was pretty nasty.

There's this thing my teachers taught me called the _spirit of battle_. It's really different from how humans (or at least American humans) see things. You're not a rebel underdog fighting for some lost cause and angsting about it.

Instead it's just you, screaming through the atmosphere, knowing that you're on the right side. That you have the blessing of your Queen, your teammates by your side, an army to back you up, and that the end result might stop a war between species.

And then, for no reason at all, leading your team in maneuvers while you're still on fire, just to show off.

_That's_ the spirit of battle. Pride. Honor. Courage. Doing what's right.

I have a sister who lives on Earth. She's probably dead now, since she's half-blood like me. But while I flew in those formations, I wasn't thinking about what would happen next, and even though that's what they want me to write about I won't. I mean, we all know how Lightspeed was formed, and that we only found the underground caves instead of our palace, and that _Fir'lit,_ a Daemon warrior we sent to consecrate the battlefield by sparring with the Rangers, was killed when the Power Rangers misunderstood and thought he was an enemy.

There's nothing to write about because it's already been said.

But that formation...

No one's said that I hoped that, wherever my sister was, I wanted her to see my spirit of battle too.


End file.
